"For now we see as if through a flawed pane of glass..." (I Corinthians 13:12)

Monday, February 19, 2018

During the early years of my ministry, a
popular text for revival preaching was II Chronicles 7:14. It called God’s
people to “turn from their wicked ways.” The “wicked ways” most
often addressed by those revival preachers related to personal immorality:
things like drinking and smoking and illicit sex, none of which were the
specific focus of this text; indeed, none of which were major emphases through
most of the Hebrew Scriptures.

In real estate, it is said that the three most important factors
are “location, location, location.” In that spirit, I would say that three of
the most important factors in biblical studies are “context, context, context.”
In this case, the text cited above is a part of the story of the dedication of
Solomon’s newly built temple.

The verse does not address any specific evil or wickedness, but,
rather, is a general promise from God regarding future times when the predictable
consequences of Israel’s predictable behavior predictably would result in hard
times and suffering. When that happens, God says, “…ifmypeople who are called by my name humble themselves, pray, seek my face, and turn from their wicked
ways, then I will hear from heaven, and will forgive their sin and heal their
land.” (NRSV)

In the context of the entire biblical account of God’s
relationship with God’s people, the sins and wickedness most often addressed
were not instances of personal immorality, but, rather, corporate sins of
injustice, idolatry, cruelty, and the ill treatment of the poor and the
dispossessed.

Jesus’ focus also was on the plight of the poor; indeed, he
welcomed and included those whose personal morality was most questionable. Personal
morality can be changed for the better when the person is addressed with
compassion and dignity; in other words, when addressed with grace.

On the other hand, corporate sins, including organized greed,
injustice, racism, class distinction, indifference toward the poor, are more
difficult to overcome. Over and over in the Hebrew Scriptures, it was these
corporate sins that most often were confronted and said to be the cause of
Israel’s downfall.

In that context, I want to take a fresh look at II Chronicles
7:14.

“If
my people, who are called by my name…”In
ancient cultures, a name was not simply a label for identification. One’s name
was a part of one’s identity. To name a person was to call that person into
presence. To call God’s name was to call God into presence. To do so
frivolously (“in vain”) was considered blasphemy and invited divine wrath. The
implication is that a people who identify themselves with God’s name are called
to reflect the nature and will of God.

“…humble
themselves…”Another
of God’s pet peeves regarding God’s people was their penchant for pride. God
often called them “stiff-necked.” Pride. Arrogance. Almost always it is
expressed as a certitude that one’s own ways and ideologies are the only
correct ones. Sound familiar? Opposing groups in our culture generally look at
each other with disdain—even with hatred. Differences are not tolerated.
Diversity is seen as a negative, rather than an enriching quality.

“…pray…”Not “thoughts and prayers” for victims and their families in
response to tragedy. The call is to intense, regular, systematic prayer that,
indeed, will “…seek (God’s) face…”; prayer
that seeks to align one’s own life and will with the life and will of God;
prayer that establishes a godly character; prayer that changes the one who
prays. If more people prayed like that, and then lived out the identity
established through that kind of prayer—lived it in the presence of all with
whom they came in contact, including the depressed, the lonely, the bullied and
the rejected—perhaps there would be fewer reasons to offer “thoughts and
prayers.”

“…and
turn from their wicked ways…” This is one of the simplest biblical descriptions of repentance. As stated above, the
wickedness that most offended God, according to the Hebrew Scriptures, was
arrogance, injustice, idolatry (the worship of other gods, including wealth and
power), cruelty and indifference toward the poor. There’s plenty of that still going
around today. Do you suppose that wickedness still offends God?

Then comes the promise: “…then I will hear from heaven, and will forgive their sin and heal their
land.”

Is it possible that the outrage against personal immorality (you
fill in the blank), is at least partially
a way of deflecting a sense of guilt over the corporate sins that offend God
and divide us?

Is it possible that the obsession with personal responsibility,
while refusing demand accountability and responsibility at the corporate level,
is at least partially a causal factor in the decline of our culture?

From the other perspective, is it possible that an unbalanced
emphasis on corporate, to the neglect of personal responsibility is a root
cause of cultural deterioration?

Jesus said to the Pharisees, “Woe to you, scribes and
Pharisees, hypocrites! For you tithe mint, dill, and cummin, and have neglected the weightier matters of the
law: justice and mercy and faith. It is these you ought to have practiced without neglecting
the others.” (Matthew 23:23 NRSV, emphasis mine)

I passionately believe it is this imbalanced approach to morality
and ethical relatioships that leads to narrow, partisan division.

What if we read this text while looking in the mirror? And what if
we got together in groups and did the same?

That’s the way it looks through the Flawed Glass that is my world
view.

In the piece, Rourke
points out what he sees as a split among American conservative Christians—a
split defined by “how inconsistent the Christian
right has been on policies that line up with the principles the Bible
would deem to be true, good and beautiful.”

On one side
of the split is the new guard: those who “appear unwilling to make the moral
compromises necessary to support the GOP as we know it.”

On the other
side is the old guard, whose…

“…problems
are enormous despite positive intentions. Many of these traditionally religious
right evangelicals pick and choose what parts of the Bible they apply to
American society, especially when it comes to the sanctity of human life. For
example, many are passionately pro-life when it comes to unborn babies but not
when it comes to women, refugees, minorities and the poor. Further they
entangle the agendas and ideologies of the church and the Republican party.
Instead of seeing America as a type of wayward Babylon, they see America as a
type of Jerusalem.”

It's not a new
distinction. Rourke uses the language of St. Augustine (4th century):
“the city of God and the city of man have competing aims. Until conservative
Christians get this, we will fail to faithfully be in the world but not of the
world” “In the world but not of the world” is a distinction implied (but not
directly stated) by Jesus in his Gethsemane prayer for his disciples (John 17).
Standing before Pilate, Jesus said, “My kingdom is not of this world” (John
18:36).

That distinction is consistent
throughout the New Testament between the kingdom of God (or the kingdom of
heaven) and the kingdom of the world, the former ruled by God and the latter
ruled by Satan. Christians live by a different standard (spirit) than that of
the world (flesh).

Augustine used the terms,
city of God/city of man. John Calvin (16th century) would try to
reorder Augustine’s city of man to make it become the city of God. His vision
for a Christian community still inspires many, although his vision of a
brutally judgmental God became counterproductive to his vision.

In Christ and Culture (1951), H. Richard Niebuhr outlined five
prevalent viewpoints with which Christianity has confronted the distinction and
relationship between the kingdom, or city, of God and the kingdom of the
world/city of man:

oChrist
against Culture.

oChrist of
Culture.

oChrist
above Culture.

oChrist and
Culture in Paradox.

oChrist
Transforming Culture.

Today’s
evangelical Christians fall, it seems to me, in either the Christ against
culture, or the Christ Transforming Culture mode. Christ against culture is
generally the position taken by dispensationalist premillennialists, who
believe the world is beyond saving, and that they are called to win as many individual
souls as possible for Christ before he returns to destroy the Prince of this
World (Satan) and establish the kingdom of God once and for all, either here on
earth or in some totally different realm.

The Christ-transforming-culture
camp believes it possible for humans to make the world Christian, and attempt
to do so by taking over the political structures of government and enacting
Christian legislation to win America back for God. It is to these
conversionists that Rourke refers in his comments.

In perhaps the
most comprehensive commentary on these distinctions to date, Gregory Boyd’s The Myth of a Christian Nation: How the
Quest for Political Power Is Destroying the Church,[1]
suggests that the two realities (the kingdom of God and the kingdom of the
world) are mutually exclusive, and cannot be merged, because they emerge out of
mutually exclusive paradigms.

The kingdom of
the world is established and maintained by what Boyd calls a “power over” model,
which he calls the power of the sword: the ability to enforce specific values
and cultures on another, with or without the other’s approval. By contrast, the
kingdom of God is established and maintained by a “power under” paradigm, which
Boyd calls the power of the cross: a Christ-like sacrificial, loving service
extended to all, including one’s enemies.

Boyd says
Christians should be involved in the political process, but should not confuse
their involvement with a manifestation of the kingdom of God. Christian
legislators can enact policies that reflect God’s will; nevertheless, those
policies do not transform a nation into the kingdom of God, because they are
established and maintained by a power over model. Only a Calvary-like love will
transform the world.

Meanwhile, the
unworkable effort to merge the two kingdoms increasingly distracts Christians
from their calling, which is to mirror the loving, inclusive, sacrificial servanthood
of Jesus of Nazareth.

Yet, we are not
simply to do nothing. We are called to “do justice, love mercy and walk humbly
with (our) God” (Micah 6:8). We are called to live as witnesses to Christ’s
Calvary-like love, even for his enemies, trusting in God’s promise (manifested by Jesus) that love is more powerful than the sword; trusting that God
can and will work through our love to transform the world.

But we are not
called to inflict or enforce that paradigm on anyone else. To do so would make
it a kingdom of the world reality.

Rourke
concludes: “The mission of the church and the
mission of the Republican Party cannot cohabitate in a strategic partnership,
regardless of how well the GOP seems to line up with Christian thought in a
given era. The closer these institutions come together, the more the church
will lose credibility and power, the more the church will look less like itself
and more like the world. To use the language of St. Augustine, the city of God
and the city of man have competing aims.”

I concur.

That’s the way
it looks through the Flawed Glass that is my world view.

Tuesday, January 16, 2018

Again, the devil took him to a very high mountain and showed him
all the kingdoms of the world and their splendor; 9 and he said to him, “All these I will give
you, if you will fall down and worship me.” 10 Jesus said to him, “Away with you, Satan!
for it is written,

‘Worship the Lord your God,and serve only
him.’”Matthew
4:8-10 (NRSV)

I
am challenged and convicted, and yet inspired, by Gregory Boyd’s book, The Myth of a Christian Nation: How the
Quest for Political Power is Destroying the Church.[1]

Boyd
distinguishes between the kingdom of God and the kingdom of the world, the latter
being advanced and sustained by a “power over” model (the power of the sword)
and the former being advanced and sustained by a “power under” model of sacrificial
love and service (the power of the cross).

The
kingdom of God, Boyd insists, is not some improved or Christianized version of
any worldly kingdom, for any worldly kingdom is based upon the power of the
sword—the ability to establish and sustain its own values and culture by
whatever means necessary, and to inflict its culture, not only upon its own citizenry,
but also, imperialistically, upon other kingdoms.

Later,
he uses this distinction to make his primary point:

“The
evangelical church in America has, to a large extent, been co-opted by an
American, religious version of the kingdom of the world. We have come to trust
the power of the sword more than the power of the cross…

“The
evidence of this is nowhere clearer than in the simple, oft-repeated, slogan
that we Christians are going to “take America back for God.” The thinking is
that America was founded as a Christian nation but has simply veered off track.
If we can just get the power of Caesar again[2],
however, we can take it back. If we can just get more Christians into office,
pass more Christian laws, support more Christian policies, we can restore this
nation to its “one nation under God” status. If we can just protect the sanctity
of marriage, make it difficult, if not impossible, to live a gay lifestyle, and
overturn Roe vs. Wade, we will be getting closer. If we can just get prayer
(evangelical Christian prayer, of course) back into our schools along with the
Ten Commandments and creationist teaching we will be restoring our country’s
Christian heritage. If we can just keep “one nation under God” in our Pledge of
Allegiance, protect the rights of Christians to speak their minds, get more
control of the liberal media, clean up the trash that’s coming out of the movie
and record industry, while marginalizing, if not eradicating, liberal groups
such as the ACLU we will have won this nation back for Jesus Christ.”[3]

Boyd
then counters with some “sobering questions”:

“First, since we are
called to mimic Jesus in all we do as citizens of the kingdom of God we have to
ask: when did Jesus ever act or talk like this? …most of Jesus’ Jewish
contemporaries wanted to “take Israel back for God.” This is precisely why they
continually tried to fit Jesus into the mold of a political messiah.”[4]

“Did Jesus ever suggest by
word or by example that we should aspire to acquire, let alone take over, the
power of Caesar? Did Jesus spend any time and energy trying to improve, let
alone dominate, the reigning government of his day? Did he ever work to pass
laws against the sinners he hung out with and
ministered to (emphasis mine)? Did he worry at all about ensuring that his
rights and the religious rights of his followers were protected? Does any author in the New Testament remotely
hint that engaging in this sort of activity has anything to do with the kingdom
of God?”[5]

Let’s
say, for the sake of discussion, that the desired ends are good, and that they are
faithful expressions of the will of God. It is not those desired ends that
trouble Boyd, nor me; rather, it is the strategy by which the evangelical
church in America seeks to accomplish those ends, namely, through the
accumulation of political power and the subsequent legislation of evangelical
Christian morality; in other words, through the establishment of a functional
state church.[6]

Boyd
never suggests that Christians shouldn’t participate in the political process;
indeed, he encourages their participation. However, such participation should
never be equated with kingdom of God interests.

Ironically,
the fact that the evangelical church is attempting to accomplish these goals by
political power is testimony to their failure—indeed, the failure of the entire
Christian movement to date ( a few isolated exceptions notwithstanding)—to accomplish the same goals using the Christ-like
strategy of sacrificial love for all, including the love of enemies.

Even
more ironic is what I consider Jesus’ clear implication that we don’t need
political power to be faithful to him and to the kingdom of God. He said that
when he is lifted up, he will draw all people to himself.[7]

That’s
the way it looks through the Flawed Glass that is my world view.

[6] “Congress shall make no
law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof…” (1st
Amendment to the Constitution of the United States of America).

[7] Some interpret this statement of Jesus
(John 12:32) to refer to his crucifixion (being lifted up on the cross), while
others see it as referring to his ascension and glorification. Either way, in
whatever way Jesus is lifted up, the promise is that he will draw all people to
himself.

Wednesday, January 3, 2018

Compromise. It’s a
dirty word to many of those whose belief systems place them toward the polar
ends of the ideological spectrum, whether the ideology is religious, political
or philosophical. And, generally speaking, the closer one’s position is to
either extreme of the spectrum, the stronger is one’s aversion to compromise.

One characteristic
of extremism is the belief than one’s own convictions are absolute, and there
are no other valid perspectives; therefore, the disdain for compromise is
justified. To compromise is to dilute truth. I have long maintained that the
only absolute quality of such a position is the absolute arrogance required to
maintain it.

In his 2002 Nobel
speech in Oslo, Jimmy Carter said, “The present era is a challenging and
disturbing time for those whose lives are shaped by religious faith based on
kindness toward each other.” In an interview with Christianity Today, he explained:

“There is a remarkable trend toward
fundamentalism in all religions—including the different denominations of
Christianity as well as Hinduism, Judaism, and Islam. Increasingly, true
believers are inclined to begin a process of deciding: ‘Since I am aligned with
God, I am superior, and my beliefs should prevail, and anyone who disagrees
with me is inherently wrong,’ and the next step is ‘inherently inferior.’ The
ultimate step is ‘subhuman,’ and then their lives are not significant.”[1]

Carter points out
the disturbing trend toward linking religious fundamentalism and political ideologies.
The result is an uncompromising rigidity and a refusal to negotiate.

Limited as we are
by the clay of which we are made, we humans are incapable of comprehending
truth absolutely (even though I believe there is absolute truth, and that it is
most nearly manifested in the life of Jesus of Nazareth.) This is old hat to
those who know me. It’s a central theme of my own identity and ideology. St.
Paul wrote, “Now we see as if through a flawed pane of glass” (I Corinthians
13:12 ~ my paraphrase). I have not yet attained the certitude necessary to
contradict St. Paul.

In his Nobel Prize
offering, Profiles in Courage, John
F. Kennedy wrote,

“It is compromise that prevents each set of reformers—the wets
and the drys, the one-worlders and the isolationists, the vivisectionists and
the anti-vivisecionists—from crushing the group on the extreme opposite end of
the political spectrum. The fanatics and extremists, and even those
conscientiously devoted to hard and fast principles are always disappointed at
the failure of their governments to rush to implement all of their principles
and to denounce those of their opponents. But the legislator has some
responsibility to conciliate those opposing forces within his state and party
and to represent them in the larger clash of interests on the national level;
and he alone knows that there are few if any issues where all the truth and all
the right and all the angels are on one side.”[2]

The reality of
serving the public is that the public will present contradicting, even
conflicting demands. For example, Kennedy recalls consecutive constituent
conferences, the first of which was with some businessmen who were asking him
to affect the removal of a federal agency that was competing with their
businesses, and the second of which was with employees of that federal agency,
who were seeking his influence to protect their jobs. Kennedy used this example
to illustrate his case for the necessity of compromise.

Given my
background in evangelical Christianity, I, too, tend to steer away from
compromise whenever possible; however, such is not a rigid principle or rule
for me. As in the issue of spanking children, it’s not so much that I oppose it
(although I do, for the reason immediately following), as that I find much more
effective ways of disciplining children. Likewise, in many cases, perhaps in
most cases of conflict, I think there is a better solution than compromise. In
compromise, one side, or all sides, give up something in order to obtain
something of higher value. Quid pro quo.

But what if both
sides could meet their needs without giving up anything? As a consultant in
conflict resolution, I frequently have seen that happen.

I don’t believe in
unsolvable problems. In most conflicts that appear unsolvable, the problem
usually is that the problem is being defined in terms of solutions. A more
effective approach is to define the problem in terms of needs.

In the example
from Kennedy’s book, the local merchants defined the problem as a need to
remove competition, while the employees of the federal agency saw the problem
as one of job security. The merchants put forth a proposed solution (get rid of
the competing agency), while the employees defined their need.

In a hypothetical
extension of the conversation, the merchants might have been more persuasive
had they identified their need for a
sustainable profit margin. Eliminating the competition is one reasonable
solution; however, to attain that solution is to take away the source of income
from those who are employed by the competition.

As a consultant, I
would have both side generate possible solutions to the need for a sustainable
profit margin. Some examples might include investing in a more effective
marketing system, engaging more visibly in the life of the community,
partnering with the competition, etc.

[Yes, I said “Partnering with
the competition.” There’s an old story (unconfirmed) about the Wright brothers
approaching the railroad industry with a proposal for partnering. The railroad
companies laughed, saying, “We’re not in the airplane business; we’re in the
railroad business!”

Within a couple of
generations, the railroads were in trouble, losing much of their business to
the faster competition. The story’s point is that the railroad industry wrongly
defined its purpose as “railroad business,” instead of “transportation
business.”

A part of the recovery of the
railroad industry included partnering with the trucking industry to
“piggy-back” loads across the country.]

Sometimes
compromise is necessary. Sometimes principles need to concede to human need.
But, I am convinced that in many cases, concessions are not necessary if the
problem or conflict is redefined and raised to a new level.

I have seen it
work time after time: in marital relationships, in parent-child relationships,
in city government, and in the corporate world. One of my funniest conflict
resolution consultations was between a local PTA (I think it’s usually called
something else these days) and the teachers of an elementary school. That’s a
story for another time.

That’s the way it
looks through the flawed glass that is my world view.

Thursday, December 28, 2017

Gregory Boyd has run the spiritual gamut: from Roman
Catholic to atheist to Pentecostal to orthodox Christianity. His theological
education includes Yale and Princeton.

Currently,
Boyd
is Senior Pastor of Woodland Hills Church in St. Paul, Minnesota and is one of
the leading spokesmen in the growing Neo-Anabaptism[1] movement, which is based
in the tradition of Anabaptism and advocates Christian pacifism and a
non-violent understanding of God.

Boyd has also long been known as a leading advocate of open
theism.[2] In addition, he is a noted
Christian anarchist and is known for his writings on the relationship between Christianity
and politics, including his best-selling book The Myth of a Christian Nation:
How the Quest for Political Power Is Destroying the Church. The book was
written after the New York Times published a front-page cover article on
Boyd's criticism of the Christian right.[3] In 2010, Boyd was listed
as one of the twenty most influential living Christian scholars.

The excerpt that follows is perhaps the most important few
paragraphs I’ve read in a long, long time! It comprises the last few pages of
the third chapter of Boyd’s book, The
Myth of a Christian Nation. Aside from some deletions (indicated) it is
presented verbatim.[4]

CONSERVATIVES AND LIBERALS WITHIN THE SAME KINGDOM

Jesus would simply not allow the world to set the terms of
his engagement with the world. This explains how (and perhaps why) he could
call Matthew, a tax collector, as well as Simon, a zealot, to be his disciples
(Matt. 10:3 – 4). Tax collectors were on the farthest right wing of Jewish
politics, zealots on the farthest left wing. To compare them to, say, Ralph
Nader and Rush Limbaugh wouldn’t come close. In fact, historical records
indicate that the zealots despised tax collectors even more than they despised
the Romans, for tax collectors not only paid taxes to support the Roman
government (something zealots deplored), but they actually made their living
collecting taxes from other Jews on Rome’s behalf . Even worse, tax collectors
often enhanced their income by charging more than was due and keeping the
difference. For this reason, zealots sometimes assassinated tax collectors!

Yet Matthew and Simon spent three years together ministering
alongside Jesus. No doubt they had some interesting fireside chats about
politics. But what is positively amazing is that they ministered together with
Jesus to advance the kingdom of God. Just as interesting, we never find a word
in the Gospels about their different political opinions. Indeed, we never read
a word about what Jesus thought about their radically different kingdom-of-the-world
views.

What this silence suggests is that, in following Jesus,
Matthew and Simon had something in common that dwarfed their individual
political differences in significance, as extreme as these differences were.
This silence points to the all-important distinctness of the kingdom of God
from every version of the kingdom of the world. To be sure, Jesus’ life and
teachings would undoubtedly transform the trust both had in their political
views if they would allow it. At the very least, as the reign of God took hold
in their lives, the tax collector would no longer cheat his clients and the
zealot no longer kill his opponents. Yet Jesus invited them both to follow him
as they were, prior to their transformation, and their widely divergent political views were never a point of
contention with Jesus [emphasis mine].

What are we to make, then, of the fact that the evangelical
church is largely divided along political lines? The Christian position is
declared to be Matthew’s among conservatives, Simon’s among liberals. While
Jesus never sided with any of the limited and divisive kingdom-of-the-world
options routinely set before him, the church today, by and large, swallows them
hook, line, and sinker. Indeed, in some circles, whether conservative or
liberal, taking particular public stands on social, ethical, and political
issues, and siding with particular political or social ideologies, is the
litmus test of one’s orthodoxy. In many quarters, individuals and groups with
different opinions about which version of the kingdom of the world is best
don’t have friendly fireside chats. If they communicate at all, it’s shouting
across picket lines![5]

What this suggests is that the church has been co-opted by
the world. To a large degree, we’ve lost our distinct kingdom-of-God vision and
abandoned our mission. We’ve allowed the world to define us, set our agenda,
and define the terms of our engagement with it. We’ve accepted the limited and
divisive kingdom-of-the-world options and therefore mirror the kingdom-of-the-world
conflicts. Because of this, we have not sought wisdom from above (James 3:17),
the wisdom Jesus consistently displayed that would help us discern a unique
kingdom-of-God approach to issues to empower our moving beyond the stalemates
and tit-for-tat conflicts that characterize the kingdom of the world. Instead, we’ve
made these conflicts our own as we fight with each other over “the Christian”
option.

We have lost the simplicity of the kingdom of God and have
largely forsaken the difficult challenge of living out the kingdom. We have
forgotten, if ever we were taught, the simple principle that the kingdom of God
looks like Jesus and that our sole task as kingdom people is to mimic the love
he revealed on Calvary. We have to a large degree gone AWOL on the kingdom of
God, allowing it to be reduced to a religious version of the world. The world
supplies the options, and in direct contradiction to Jesus’ example, we think
it’s our job to pronounce which one God thinks is right.

A DIFFICULT SIMPLICITY

Our central job is not to solve the world’s problems. Our
job is to draw our entire life from Christ and manifest that life to others.
Nothing could be simpler—and nothing could be more challenging. Perhaps this
partly explains why we have allowed ourselves to be so thoroughly co-opted by
the world. It’s hard to communicate to a prostitute her unsurpassable worth by
taking up a cross for her, serving her for years, gradually changing her on the
inside, and slowly winning the trust to speak into her life (and letting her
speak into our life, for we too are sinners). Indeed, this sort of Calvary-like
love requires one to die to self.

It is much
easier, and more gratifying, to assume a morally superior stance and feel good
about doing our Christian duty to vote against “the sin of prostitution”
[emphasis mine].

Perhaps this explains why many evangelicals spend more time
fighting against certain sinners in the political arena than they do
sacrificing for those sinners. But Jesus calls us and empowers us to follow his
example by taking the more difficult, less obvious, much slower, and more
painful road—the Calvary road. It is the road of self-sacrificial love.

When we adopt this distinct kingdom-of-God stance,
everything changes. While living in the kingdom of the world, of course, we
still wrestle with tax and inheritance issues. And we should do so as decently
and as effectively as possible. But our unique calling as kingdom people is not
to come up with God’s opinion of the right solution to these issues. Our unique
calling is simply to replicate Christ’s sacrificial love in service to the
world.

When we return to the simplicity and difficulty of the
kingdom of God, the question that defines us is no longer, “What are the
Christian policies and candidates?” No, when love is placed above all kingdom-of-the-world
concerns (Col. 3:14; 1 Peter 4:8), the kingdom-of-the-world options placed
before us dwindle in significance—as much as Matthew’s and Simon’s fireside
opinions were dwarfed in significance by their common allegiance to Jesus. For
we, like Matthew and Simon know that the one question we are commanded to
wrestle with is this: “How do we love like Christ loves?” Or to ask the same
question in different ways: “How do we communicate to others the unsurpassable
worth they have before God? How can we individually and collectively serve in
this particular context? How can we ‘come under’ people here and now? How can
we demonstrate Calvary love to every person?” The revolution Jesus came to
bring was “a genuinely human one,” as Andre Trocme notes. “People, not
principles, were his concern.”[6]

We need not be able to figure out how society should tax its
citizens, enforce inheritance laws, or deal with prostitutes. Neither Jesus,
nor Paul, nor any New Testament author gave inspired pronouncements about such
matters. But that does not prevent us from washing the feet of overly taxed
citizens, disgruntled younger brothers, and despised prostitutes. Jesus and the
New Testament authors gave plenty of inspired pronouncements about that.

[2] Open Theism is the thesis that, because God loves us
and desires that we freely choose to reciprocate His love, He has made His
knowledge of, and plans for, the future conditional upon our actions. Though
omniscient, God does not know what we will freely do in the future. [http://www.iep.utm.edu/o-theism/]

[4] Boyd, Gregory A.. The Myth of a Christian Nation: How the
Quest for Political Power Is Destroying the Church (pp. 62-65). Zondervan.
Kindle Edition.

[5] Eller’s comment is relevant: “A prime
characteristic of worldly politics is its invariable framing of itself as an ‘adversarial
contest.’ There has to be a battle. One party, ideology, cause, group, lobby,
or power bloc which has designated itself as ‘the Good, the True, and the
Beautiful’ sets out to overbear, overwhelm, overcome, overpower, or otherwise
impose itself on whatever opposing parties think they deserve the title.” And
it is “a power contest among the morally pretentious.” [Vernard Eller, Christian Anarchy: Jesus’ Primacy over the
Powers (Grand Rapids, Mich.: Eerdmans, 1987).]

Monday, October 16, 2017

Are you sick of the
belligerence that increasingly characterizes our culture and our way of living
and relating? I am. Sadly, there are some who seem to relish the antagonism,
and actually to delight in provoking it (“Let’s you and him fight!”).

Sometimes I lose hope
of seeing humanity united and cooperating; of seeing people of different
persuasions coming together to glean the best from each of their different
outlooks, and creating a new reality better than their previously held dogmas.

In recent efforts to
understand the roots of the current animosity, I looked to my own discipline:
Christian theology and church history. Beginning with Augustine in the 4th
century, mainstream Christianity took a discernable turn toward law over grace.

That happens in virtually
every movement, religious or otherwise. As entrepreneurial founders begin to
age, they tend to become caretakers and defenders of their accomplishments.
Thus, begins the paradigm shift from movement to institution.

Each succeeding
generation adds to the growing set of rules and procedural codes (as in the
Constitution of the United States with its amendments and expanding volumes of
interpretive laws and codices).

In the Judaism
described in the Bible, the trend reached its zenith in the pharisaism Jesus
confronted. In Christian history the penchant for rules over grace maxed out
under John Calvin and, later in England, the Puritans.

Oppressed in Europe,
the Puritans came to America, and were the dominant socio/religious force in
colonial America. Most Christian sects in America reflected the harshness of
Puritanism, well into the middle of the twentieth century. During the
infamously rebellious 1960s, a secularized[1][1]
form of Christianity emerged. It rejected the harsh, judgmental, punitive images
of God, in favor of a more Christ-like image.

That “more
secularized” movement culminated in the last couple of decades into what some
have called the “Emerging Church.” In response, the Calvinist/Puritan-oriented
bodies doubled down own their insistence that their image of God, and only
their image, was the truth, declaring open season on any who disagreed.

The trouble was, each
denomination and sect claimed its own set of rules that defined truth; so,
everybody was fighting with everybody, and the “spiritually yearning,
institutionally disillusioned public”[2]
was leaving the church. In the panic over the loss of members (and offerings),
the institutional church ramped up its condemnatory rhetoric, which, in turn,
drove still more members and offerings into the streets.

Essentially, the
Calvinist/Puritan inflexibility was less about seeking truth, and more about
proving that I/We already have the truth. The church generally was seen as
issuing an ultimatum; and people (particularly those in the millennial
generations) stereotyped all churches as judgmental and unforgiving, and they
fled en masse from the model in which
they were unable to sense the presence of Jesus.

I developed an
hypothesis: Given that through the middle of the twentieth century, American
culture generally was molded by some expression of Christianity, and given the
generally judgmental and hostile stereotype into which all churches were
lumped, it seemed reasonable that the current cultural and political
fractiousness were in that mix, somewhere. I still believe there is a level in
which that hypothesis is valid.

But the
pre-Augustinian church already was divided. Paul’s epistles often address
congregational division. Some creeds (the Apostles’ Creed and the Creed of
Nicaea) emerged prior to the time of Augustine.

In colonial America
the political divisiveness already was so bitter that duels to the death were
fought.

So, the search for
the origins of our current socio/political enmity is like peeling an onion. For
the present, I lean toward considering it to be the nature of broken humanity.
Maybe it’s not only what we have become. Maybe humans always have been like this;
and we are living out our brokenness, rather than living out Jesus' prayer that
his followers would become one, as he and his heavenly father were one (John
17:20-21).

Hard sins linked to
sexual immorality or religious heresy notwithstanding, could it be that our
primary need for repentance is from the primordial state of human brokenness out of which all other brokenness arises?
Are we tinkering with symptoms and ignoring the cause?

Repentance does not
require regret or remorse; nor does it necessarily involve penitence or
penance. The word means, simply, to turn; essentially, to turn from one way of
doing and being to another.

I try to not obsess
over things I cannot control. Occasionally I even succeed! I don’t know how to
influence the general turn of ideologies toward “us all becoming one.” But I can control how I respond; and I perhaps can influence one or a
few persons to consider unity over division. That outlook forms the basis of my
own repentance in regard to the focus of this writing.

How about this: evil
always needs to be confronted; but, before we mount our white horse and charge
into the fray, could we take a bit of time, first,
to set aside the temptation to blame everyone but ourselves for the way things
are, and to engage, instead, in some
tangible act intended to make the world better, if only for a moment; if only
for one other person?

If we could start
each day planning to act or participate proactively in some constructive
activity, before turning to the
headlines or (worse) Facebook tirades or Twitter harangues, would a
constructive outlook lead to a more effective way of responding to those who
disagree with us? It’s at least an attempt to be a part of the solution, rather
than the problem.

What is there to
lose? Is our current culture of denunciation and vilification leading toward a
better world?

That’s the way it
looks through the Flawed Glass that is my world view.

Together in the walk,

Jim

[1] Secular, not in
rejection of God, Scripture or Christianity, but rather, in rejection of what
was deemed a distortion of God,
Scripture and Christianity. In other words, a rejection of the
institutionalization of Christianity.

[2] A description coined by
Thomas G. Bandy in Christian Chaos
and other of his writings.

Tuesday, September 26, 2017

I’ve had enough of the uproar over NFL players
kneeling during the National Anthem. If it were going somewhere—if there were a
beneficial conclusion in sight—if anybody had anything new or different to say
about it, I might have a different perspective. I’m just tired of the endless
repetition of talking points devoid of any productive movement toward
resolution.

September 25, on Monday Night Football, the Dallas
Cowboys, their owner and their coaches, walked to the center of the field, arms
linked, and knelt for a few seconds before the anthemwas played, and they were soundly booed; which suggests the
ballyhoo really may not be about disrespecting the anthem at all.

A man of color protested the ways some people of
color are being unjustly treated. The preponderance of evidence—the tone of the
bulk of social media reaction—suggests that had Mr.
Kaepernick been white, and had he been protesting taxes, the public outcry
likely would have been different.

In the first place, it’s a first amendment issue; and
there’s a credible sense in which the primary outcry comes from the same populace
that is passionate in its defense of the second amendment, as if one amendment is more important than another. Given our current
political majority, and given that the President of the United States said that
NFL players who kneel during the National Anthem should be fired[1], I think I can
build a case that our first amendment rights are more likely to be abused than
are our second amendment rights.

In the second place, taking a knee was never intended
as an act of disrespect—of the anthem, or the flag or the sacrifice of our
military personnel. Most of those who have chosen to take a knee have stated as
much. As a veteran who has served under fire, I take no offense and sense no
disrespect. In fact, I served (so I’m told) precisely to defend the rights of
those who peacefully protest. More importantly, I served to defend the rights
of those on whose behalf the NFL players are protesting.

In the third place, the magnitude of reaction against
the act of taking a knee is effectively, if not intentionally, a gross distraction
from the real issue. The motivation behind the kneeling protest is the documentable
reality that people of color (and other minorities) are treated differently than
whites are treated.

I repeat: the documentable
reality. But the slightest mention of that reality on social media garners
immediate and hostile response. Many people take even general comments about
racism very personally, as if those comments amount to accusations directed
specifically at them. I have to wonder why they think that!

I’ve seen a lot of statements that begin with, “I’m
so tired of people playing the racism card!” Well, it’s not a card, and it’s
not being “played.” It’s a reality that hurts many people! Yet, there may be no
stronger denial in the USA than the denial of racism.

Finally, the comments I hear and read build a
compelling case that the public outcry really is not about disrespect, but
about disagreement. Intolerance of disagreement, or of difference, is one of
the fastest growing and most dangerous cultural trends of our time. I guess
that’s my primary point in this blog.

What we have lost in our culture is not simply the ability
to disagree respectfully; what we have lost is any sense that disagreement can
have a positive conclusion. We have lost all sense of unity, replacing it with a
demand for uniformity—and not just any uniformity. The demand is that everyone
agree and conform with “my/our” perspective.

In the past, I have written often about the growing
obsession with “being right”—the arrogant[2] assumption
that I/we, and only I/we, are absolutely right; the custodians of absolute
truth.

Limited as we are by the clay of which we are made,
none of us humans is capable of comprehending absolute truth. Without the
humility to accept and acknowledge that my/our perspective is partial and
incomplete, and that we need each other’s insights to build consensus (rather
than inflicting one perspective) there will never be unity among humans.

Until we stop shouting, and start listening—really listening—to
each other, there will always be a need to protest.

I have wished Mr. Kaepernick had chosen a more
effective expression of protest—one less counterproductive to his own cause.
But, I have to wonder, given the animosity that is infecting more and more of
our population, whether it would have been possible for him to find any
expression of protest that would have been greeted with a less hostile
reaction. I fear that’s what we have become.

Maybe on our knees is where we all need to be.

That’s the way I see it through the flawed glass that
is my world view.

Together
in the Walk,

Jim

[1] And the owner of the Dallas
Cowboys, Jerry Jones, said he would do so, which leads me to wonder whether
such firings would be grounds for a viable lawsuit on the basis of violation of
first amendment rights.

[2] To assume absolute truth is
to assume equal status with God, which not only is arrogant; it’s blasphemous! As
I understand the doctrine of original sin, it is related to that assumption.